Popular pets
Stick insects (phasmatodea). Who remembers them?
They were popular pets when I was a youngster and were housed in a vivarium.
Most schools usually had a few on the nature table.
As I recall we fed them Privet leaves and the creatures would periodically shed their skin.
I would watch the little animals closely and I would fall to musing. What goes on in their alien minds?
Sometimes they appear to brood, as if in meditation.
They thrum with psychic energy and quiver, not unlike a struck tuning fork.
Perhaps they are harbingers of a revelation unknown to us mortals – their legs and torsos stick out at varied angles and I wonder if they are agents of an intelligent cosmic entity, using the language of semaphore to communicate with their masters.
Maybe not so far-fetched after all as they are cousins to the only animal that does actually appear to pray, the praying mantis (mantodea).
These fellows are indeed known to bow their heads as if in supplication to their deity.
Another subject that really gets my goat is that when one is on the lookout for a second-hand motor car, does anyone else find the advertisements often misleading and controversial? For instance a 12-year-old car is offered as being ‘in showroom condition’ or ‘pristine’. Never mind its age or the fact it has 100,000 miles on the odometer. This is blatantly misleading. The one that really flummoxes me though is ‘no timewasters’ Why should anyone wish to waste another’s time? Not only is it a waste of time writing that, but it’s also downright rude. What it says to me is: ‘If you come and look at my car, and having discovered it is not as advertised or not to your taste and you decide not to buy it, you will have been wasting my time’. It also says the seller is an ignorant fool, who knows nothing about business or customer services, yet they still expect to make money on the sale. I would not go anywhere near anyone putting such idiotic terms in a for sale advert. It is poor salesmanship and a little aggressive even. It says that the seller is such a busy person that they have little time for something as mundane as selling a car and indeed anyone who takes a look is an irrelevance and a downright nuisance. Bursledon Road, Waterlooville